


Ashley Goes On A Trip

by Kikansha



Category: Starlight Express - Phillips/Stilgoe/Webber
Genre: Drugs, Humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-27
Updated: 2016-09-27
Packaged: 2018-08-17 13:08:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 998
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8145163
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kikansha/pseuds/Kikansha
Summary: Ashley finds a cigarette on the ground and proceeds to give the other coaches a headache.





	

Ashley needed a fucking break. 

The coach shed was a mess of conversation. Pearl wouldn't shut her trap about how many times Rusty had whistled at her from across the yard. Buffy listed every bit of gossip from the freight sidings. Dinah was a broken record about Greaseball-this and Greaseball-that. Not a lick of peace and quiet to be found. 

At the very least, the majority of tracks in the AV Yard were silent this time of night. Maybe the occasional laugh from the freight cars on their tracks on the other end or from Greaseball and his Gang's shed. Other than that? Peace.

Ashley perched on a rusting buffer, lighting a cigarette and popping it between her lips. The motions of grabbing a cig were almost hard wired into her at this point. Smoking got Ashley to relax. A cool down from the stress of whatever had been occurring that day. 

As per the usual, it didn't take long for the white stick to be worn down to its brown end, used up. Ashley threw the butt on the ground and rolled over it with a wheel, putting out the last flickers of heat it still had in it. Her arm instinctively reached for another one. 

Nothing. 

Of all the times for her to need to restock, now?

"Starlight." 

No chance of anywhere to get another pack being open at this hour. To make things worse, the coupler-tease of thinking she had more had made her irritable. 

Ashley was just about to head back to the coach shed when her eyes panned across a graffitied area of one of the old depot buildings. 

On the ground was a cigarette. Unsmoked. Ripe for the taking. 

"Thank Starlight." 

Ashley rolled over and reached down for the white object, noting that it looked a little different from what she was used to. It lacked a brown end and had a slightly different shape to it. Had to be foreign or something. 

The lighter emerged from her small cargo compartment, quickly flicking to life and bringing flame to one end of the cig. It ignited quickly, providing a soft light that illuminated Ashley's face. 

She brought it to her lips, inhaling deeply and closing her eyes. 

"Ech!" Her hand fell to her side as she coughed - unusual for her. This thing has gone rotten. There wasn't a hint of the flavor she was used to. It tasted absolutely vile.

"I don't understand why an-"

Then it hit her.

Pretty colors dancing in front of her eyes. The rectangular objects of the train yard around her twisting into a variety of curves. Ashley felt weightless. Like she could fly. Wait, she was flying. The buildings seemed like ants below her. Maybe they were. The entire  
earth below her pulsed with a rainbow of hues.

"WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO-"

 

The other coaches had barely managed to drag Ashley back to the shed. All of them were clues as to what she had gotten into by only being away for a few minutes, but it had thrown her into an unpredictable state. The whole half-mile across the yard she'd been screaming about being able to smell colors.

Now they had laid her on the couch, smoke lightly rising from the pipe on the back of her head. Apparently said pipe was able to function. Not even Buffy had seen it do that. They had all assumed it was just a hair accessory.

"Ashley? You okay sugar?" The buffet car examined her best friend, trying to at least get an idea of what had gone wrong.

Ashley's eyes finally opened, both having turned a reddish hue.

"I've seen... some scrap." She muttered.

"What sort of scrap?" Dinah chirped from behind the other two coaches. Ashley took at full thirty seconds to reply, almost as if she hadn't heard the first three times.

"Belle never existed... I was the sleeper." Ashley drooped into the cushions, seeing to be rather out of it. Pearl jumped and propped her back up straight, wanted to avoid the coach being damaged to burned by the smoke.

"I thought you liked Belle. We're all on good term-" Buffy continued to interrogate, but was suddenly cut off by the woozy smoking car.

"WE LOOKED LIKE FUCKING SLUTS!" Ashley blurted out loud enough to make the walls of the coach shed tremble. Dinah nearly stumbled, having to grab Buffy's coupling loops to avoid falling on her rump.

"I'm Duvay!" Ashley held a hand up and tried to sing. "I'm a sleeper, but you won't... get much sleep!" 

Pearl opened her mouth to contribute to the conversation, but was interrupted by Ashley forcefully grabbing a bowl of sweets sitting on the adjacent table and dumping the entire thing down the hatch.

"FOOD."

The brown-clad coach shakily got to her skates and dashed through her cohorts, disappearing into the freight yard. The other three coaches were absolutely bewildered.

 

"I found her!" Dinah shouted to the other two, standing in front of a pile of extra coal for engines like Rusty and Poppa. Buffy and Pearl rolled along side, taking a look at the spectacle before them.

Ashley sat waist deep in the coal pile, attempting to devour the black stones. Her brown, finely pattered dress was almost black as soot. The stack on her head now emitted a much darker, dirtier smoke than before.

"Calm down, girl!" Buffy skated close enough to pull Ashley from the coal without dirtying her own paintwork. The smoking car proceeded to eat whatever coal she had in her hands before looking around frantically. Her eyes finally rested on Dustin's spare pile of aggregates (You know, 'cause they're really great).

Despite her attempts to roll over and devour the pile, Dinah and Pearl managed to keep her in place, dragging her back towards the coach shed. They'd lock the door this time.

None the less, it was going to be a long night.

"THE ROCKIES AND DUSTIN HAD CHILDREN, AND THEY RAPPED! RAPPED!"


End file.
